This was an odd pairing to begin with (and a publicity stunt to say the least). Craig obviously has a standard philosophy of religion background and can stand on his own. Hitchens, however, seems to be standing on the shoulders of his fellow atheist contemporaries (e.g. Dawkins, Dennett, Sagan), making his act a bit of a sideshow. All in all, the major points made in this debate were as old as theology itself. I suspect that Craig knew of Hitchen’s debating style (being a laundry list of pithy facts interlaced with dry wit) and decided to dust off some old philosophical artillery for the standoff. This had the same effect as watching a tall man holding back a short man’s punches by stretching out his arm to hold the aggressor’s head. I am fairly sure that the only effective weapons that the atheist possesses are irony, storytelling, art, and a narrative connection with the zeitgeist…. which is why Voltaire and Nietzsche were so effective. Arguments come and go, but stories last forever.
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This was an odd pairing to begin with (and a publicity stunt to say the least). Craig obviously has a standard philosophy of religion background and can stand on his own. Hitchens, however, seems to be standing on the shoulders of his fellow atheist contemporaries (e.g. Dawkins, Dennett, Sagan), making his act a bit of a sideshow. All in all, the major points made in this debate were as old as theology itself. I suspect that Craig knew of Hitchen’s debating style (being a laundry list of pithy facts interlaced with dry wit) and decided to dust off some old philosophical artillery for the standoff. This had the same effect as watching a tall man holding back a short man’s punches by stretching out his arm to hold the aggressor’s head. I am fairly sure that the only effective weapons that the atheist possesses are irony, storytelling, art, and a narrative connection with the zeitgeist…. which is why Voltaire and Nietzsche were so effective. Arguments come and go, but stories last forever.
-Chris Borgman
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